Pushing the point

The Department for Transport is known for taking a dim view of contractors speaking out of turn, or indeed at all in some cases, but its civil servants really should have warned Treasury colleagues that Stagecoach boss Brian Souter is not the man to push this point with.

A recent letter from the Treasury Solicitors department to Souter suggested forcefully that he should not discuss South West Trains’ impending legal action against DfT with civil servants. Souter’s response was...